Men's Water Polo

Water Polo Suffers 10-7 Loss to Harvard

Sophomore Ory Tasman

Oct 16, 2013

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. – After being three goals behind at the end of the first period, the MIT water polo team were able to close the gap a bit but ultimately fell to Harvard University, 10-7, at home on Wednesday evening. This is only the Engineers' third home game of the season, the other two occurring at the end of last month, when they fell to Brown but won against Connecticut College. Tech, who is currently No. 7 in the Division III rankings, is now 6-10 for the season, while Harvard improved to 10-8.

Sophomore Ory Tasman (Orlando, Fla.) led the Cardinal and Gray with his three goals, scoring the first MIT goal with one minute remaining in the first period and the other two 40 seconds apart in the second. Senior Craig Cheney (Sherwood, Ore.) wasn't far behind, notching two goals that were scored during the final two quarters. On top of his two goals, Cheney led MIT with his three steals, three shots, three ejections drawn and an assist.

Freshmen keepers Nolan Kruse (Orcutt, Calif.) and Ian Zaun (Manhattan Beach, Calif.) split their time in net. Kruse tended the net for the first 16 minutes, tallying five blocks during that time. Zaun took over for the remaining two periods and notched eight blocks and a steal.

Tech played best in the third and fourth quarters, holding the Crimson to just two goals while scoring four of its own, shot by Cheney and sophomores Matthew Orton (Los Altos Hills, Calif.) and Kale Rogers (Newberg, Ore.). The Engineers played aggressively in the final few minutes but ran out of time before being able to gain further on the Crimson.

This weekend, MIT will travel to Baltimore for the Division III Eastern Championships, which will be hosted by Johns Hopkins University from Saturday through Sunday, Oct. 19-20. On Saturday, the Engineers will face Penn State Behrend at 11:15 a.m. before playing against Washington & Jefferson at 5:15 p.m. that same day. It will be determined who Tech will play the following day based upon the results of the first two games.